Historically, furniture pieces are manufactured and assembled at the factory and then shipped as a complete unit to the distributor or customer. The sections of the piece are joined by large bolts which extend through predrilled holes in the sections. In some furniture, the assembly is covered with upholstery partially concealing the bolts. The resulting assembly can be cumbersome to deliver to the customer or simply transport from one location to another. Additionally, the size of the furniture piece may make delivery to certain locations impossible because of dimensional constraints in hallways, doorways and stairways. As a result, customers may have limited selection of furniture because of the size and weight of fully assembled furniture pieces.
Knock-down (KD) or ready-to-assemble (RTA) furniture has been developed in order to overcome such shortcomings and to provide increased options in the storage, delivery and moving of furniture. Unfortunately, early versions of ready-to-assemble furniture lacked strength and stability particularly under heavy loads. The furniture was perceived as flimsy and unreliable particularly as to the means for fastening the components of the furniture pieces. Screws or bolts were used to secure the components which tend to loosen upon extended use resulting in a breakdown of the piece. Such fasteners also do not lend themselves to quick and simple disassembly of the furniture piece requiring tools for removal of the bolts or screws. In some instances, repeated assembly and disassembly of the furniture piece may strip the fasteners ultimately resulting in their failure.
Customers within the display and furniture industries have recognized the need for versatile, portable, durable furniture units which are easy to assemble and disassemble, which will stack compactly for shipping or storage, and will easily reconfigure to meet changing needs. Such functional units of furniture have application as display stands for art galleries, tables and stools for retail and industry use, and furniture for children, trade shows, restaurants, and homes.
Conceptually functional units of furniture such as tables and stools involve the vertical support of a horizontally planar surface (e.g., the top of a given furniture unit) above another horizontally planar surface (e.g., the floor or an attached base of the given furniture unit). Pre-assembled furniture units are often bulky to warehouse, expensive to ship, and cumbersome to move. Furniture units labeled ready-to-assemble (RTA) or knock-down (KD) often require complicated assembly instructions, a lengthy time to complete the project, and no guarantee that the completed unit will disassemble and reassemble. Moreover, in the above, each furniture unit is likely offered as a set package which combines a predetermined height and width of vertical planar piece(s) with a predetermined length and width of horizontal piece(s). Neither vertical nor horizontal piece(s) can be easily reconfigured to create a different functional unit of furniture.
Using one known technique, the vertical structural members are held together using structural reinforcement members. These structural reinforcement members consist of short wooden dowels. The wooden dowels are inserted horizontally between the vertical structural members at the top and bottom of the vertical structural members to cause self alignment and increased structural integrity. Cams and bolts are used between the vertical structural members and the horizontally top planar surface. If there was a horizontally base planar surface, cams and bolts are also used between the horizontally base planar surface and the vertical structural members. There are problems with using wooden dowels to hold the vertical structural members together. Wooden dowels may break easily, and they have a tendency to swell in humid weather making assembly and disassembly difficult.
Another known technique uses short steel pins as structural reinforcement members instead of wooden dowels. Problems also occur with this technique since the short steel pins are not long enough to penetrate the interior of the vertical structural members sufficiently. With rough handling, the vertical structural members could be torqued out of alignment. This effects structural stability. Thus, despite a large effort expended by designers and manufacturers of furniture, many drawbacks still exist.
What is needed to overcome these problems associated with the prior art, is a ready to assemble article of furniture that has a minimal number of components that are configured to be easily assembled and disassembled without the need of tools, adhesives or other external fastening means.